hearX Group Selected as Local Accelerate2030 Finalist

mHealth startup, the hearX Group, has been selected as one of three South African finalists in the Accelerate2030 programme.

The mHealth startup behind the world’s first clinical smartphone hearing test solutions, the hearX Group, has been selected as one of three South African finalists in the Accelerate2030 programme.

Accelerate2030 is a nine month programme run by Impact Hub Geneva and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) that aims to scale the impact of ventures that contribute towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) internationally. This is achieved by helping them to become more investment-ready, and measure their impact in order to scale internationally.

The hearX Group was one of 17 projects that entered from South Africa and 324 applications worldwide. They were initially selected as a semi-finalist to compete alongside five other local projects to determine which of the three local finalists would be competing against 49 other finalist from around the world.

The hearX Group was selected as one of the three finalists from South Africa during their pitch event on the 4th of July held at Impact Hub Johannesburg.

“The judges were enthusiastic about our product and they were interested to see how we can broaden our impact in communities and how far we could expand our scope of influence, if we are selected as winners in the Acceleration programme,” said Marketing Manager at the hearX Group, Tanya Boretti.

According to the hearX Group, their mHealth platform impacts two SDG targets, Goal 3: Good Health & Well­being and Goal 4: Quality Education.

“We have provided hearing and vision care services to more than 50,000 persons globally through our technology in low­ and middle­ income countries around the globe, particularly in sub­-Saharan Africa. At least half of these have been young preschool and school aged children for whom hearing and vision loss are leading contributors to academic failures,” said Boretti.

“Other vulnerable groups benefiting directly from our technology are patients with multi-drug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) who are on medications that cause hearing loss. Our technology is used in more than 20 countries to monitor hearing in these patients to inform treatment to avoid hearing loss. Other areas of impact include preventative occupational health hearing testing in the industry sector,” continued Boretti.

The remaining Accelerate2030 finalists will be judged remotely from Geneva where 10 winners will be selected for the programme. The 10 winners will then travel to Geneva towards the end of 2017 to participate in the Scaling Bootcamp in Switzerland.

“We hope that if we’re selected as a winner for the Accelerate2030 programme that we’ll be afforded the opportunity to broaden our reach and achieve our vision of healthy hearing for everyone, everywhere,” said Boretti.

“We also hope to gain access to a global network of experts in scaling our product more extensively internationally. Working with experts and partners, who will assist us with achieving our targets and the access we’ll receive to the strategic partnerships, will assist us with providing our solution to as many people as possible,” concluded Boretti.